Gay male (in)visibility on TV and film

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Seeing is Deceiving

Visibility is strange. The more one is seen, the less one is really noticed. Having cut my cord recently, I’m nevertheless eager to consider how much and whether two new middish season shows really improve gay male visibility.

Thenew series on HBO (using an article rather than a preposition instantly makes this blog that much more justified!) which based on its creators looked promising, is seeming ever more like the Gay Guys in Apartment 3-G, at least from episode rundowns I’ve been following.

Does male sexual preoccupation still equal gay, and/or should it? It’s really an open question. After a certain point, like a stenciled dys-erection, sexual conquest declines culturally for straight men, though it could be gender equality changing the equation for them.

Neither show breaks new ground, and each has plenty of precedents. Apples and oranges, or are they? One is maybe “looking” from the wrong end of the telescope, the other from the “normal” one. Maybe they both have their place, at least for now.